Entertainment For Lively Minds
Neil Young - where should I stop?
Posted by Ola Claesson on 6 March 2010 - 10:45am.
I have been on a massive Neil bender during the latest weeks. With the help/"help" of Spotify it´s possible to listen to the albums I´ve previously carefully been avoiding. Yesterday I heard myself think "Re-ac-tor is actually a pretty good album".
Is it time to worry and seek help? I promise to let you know before I decide to give Landing On Water another chance.
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I think you can safely avoid the following:
Neil Young
American Stars and Bars (with the exception of 'Like a Hurricane' obviously)
Hawks and Doves
Re-ac-tor (oh ... too late)
Trans
Everybody's Rockin'
Old Ways
Landing on Water
Life
This Note's For You
Arc (Live)
Mirror Ball
Broken Arrow
Year of the Horse (Live)
Road Rock: Vol 1
Are You Passionate
That sounds like a lot, but it still leaves plenty of sublime albums.
American Stars and Bars
How can you possibly ignore the fantastic Will To Love? It's one of my favourite Neil songs, and one of his strangest. I love the sound of the logs crackling on the fire that you can hear in the background which combined with those very enigmatic lyrics create a really spooky atmosphere.
On the same album I'll also speak up for Star Of Bethlehem and Hold Back the Tears. So we have at least half a decent album already.
I totally disagree with you about This Note's For You. Ten Men Working, Coupe De Ville, Married Man, Life In The City as well as the title track are all really good songs. One of my major disappointments with Neil's career is that he never brought the Blue Notes to tour over here.
Ok, maybe I was a little hasty about Stars and Bars
... but, some years ago I decided to try to cure myself of the completists syndrome - keeping only those albums which I really, really liked. (I still have 15 NY albums + Deja Vu)
Maybe it's a moment in time thing
But I had a phase of listening to "This note's for you" constantly - must dig out the vinyl and see how it stands up. not a classic NY, but interesting as a niche offering I venture.
Little Wing
off Hawks And Doves is really gorgeous.
I quite like Landing On Water, especially Weight Of The World.
None more eighties-sounding. But then I love Goldfrapp's latest single too.
Same here...
..Violent Side also. Never really got into "Life" though.
A lot of the antipathy towards Mirrorball...
...originates from Neil Young's choice of backing band - Pearl Jam, who at the time were considered the vanguard of the major record label's exploitation of grunge and therefore inauthentic corporate rock.
I think that it's one of Neil's best albums - a collection of epic songs (and a couple of fragile sketches). Scenery, Truth Be Known, Big Green Country - These are all superb. And what about the way that the pump organ (used to stately effect on the unplugged version of Like A Hurricane) is forced to go against its ponderous nature and rock-out with the rest of the band end of Peace & Love?
Good call backwards
I wasn't too fond of Mirror Ball at the time; it seemed sloppy and sludgy compared to his previous release, Sleeps With Angels. Actually, I now think that it is the later album that holds up better, possibly. It's a spontaneous yawp of an album, seemingly tossed out without much thought and all the better for it. If only all music from 1995 aged this well.
Broken Arrow
Is one of my favourite NY albums - I came to the man late, but once converted picked up all the LPs. I also have a soft spot for Landing On Water which is not as bad as some critics would have you believe.
25 Years A Neil Young Fan...
...and I recently got rid of my whole CD collection - bar three albums.
As much as I like Neil Young, I have long realised that he has not produced a single album that I can confidently listen to from beginning to end without despising several tracks.
I don't miss my Neil Young collection. It was like a monkey on my back.
I held on to:
Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere Cowgirl In The Sand and Down By The River are monumental pieces of work that I don't think Young has ever matched. And the title track is a beaut, too.
After The Goldrush Mainly it's for nostalgic reasons. The first notes of Tell Me Why were my introduction to Neil Young - and despite Oh Lonesome Me, I can pretty much enjoy the whole album. And, I wish Southern Man went on for another three minutes.
Tonight's The Night This I can happily listen to from top to bottom.
Of the stuff I got rid of, I probably most enjoyed Re-act-or and Are You Passionate. Weird, huh?
Oh, and the best version of Like A Hurricane is the one found on Berlin Live. He positively nailed it on that one.
"On The Beach"
... can't believe you got of rid of that - but agree that "Tonight's the Night" is indispensable.
Ambulance Blues...
...that's the problem. I could never abide the long rambling acoustic numbers. Last Trip To Tulsa, is another example. I quite liked Hawks and Doves, too, but half the album is The Old Homestead - ack!
I just heard Hawks And Doves for the first time (15 years in)
...having seen the name check above (thank you Sting Ono - name of horror) and I must say I really like The Old Homestead, but then I do have a serious chrash on Levon Helm´s style of drumming. You´re right about the song being half the album, but this is mainly due to the fact that the other songs are too short.
Can you hear
someone shouting on The old Homestead, but very faintly like they're a mile away?
A CRUSH on Levon Helm´s style of drumming.
Nothing else. Although it makes sense still. Nice Freudian.
But to answer your question - yes, I do. Another member of The Band? Sounds familiar.
So...
You got rid of Harvest, On The Beach and Rust Never Sleeps? I can't be a part of this conversation any more.
Having said that, if you want Southern Man to be longer, can I recommend the version on Four Way Street?
Of course I got rid of Harvest,
"Words" makes my heart sink. It was bad enough at the length he released it on Harvest - and, then he went and resurrected it for live performances (Glastonbury 2009, for example) and just about doubled the length of it. It had to go.
As for Rust Never Sleeps: One version of My My, Hey Hey is quite enough. Playing the same song twice on an album is, quite frankly, perverse. And, unlike Tonight's The Night, the rest of the album doesn't make up for it.
As for playing a song twice, he does the same thing on Sleeps With Angels: Western Hero and Train of Love - exactly the same song.
Train Of Love/Western Hero
More than that, the whole of Sleeps With Angels unfolds, like a mirror, from the centre out. Most, if not every, song on the album has its mirror image. These two are the most obviously similar, but I believe the theory holds out. Ish.
When my brother moved out of home circa 1981
we had a long (very long) argument about who owned which albums, we both claimed Hawks and Doves and Reactor but neither wanted Trans, He said "It's got your name on it" and I said, "Yeah but it's in your handwriting"
Interestingly we both claimed Time Fades Away which in no way deserves its fate of never being released on cd. Don't Be Denied is worth the price of entry on its own.
To be honest
I quite like Trans. Sample And Hold, Transformer Man and Computer Age are pretty good songs. The live versions show their basic strength and Like An Inca is a cracking song.
Sample and Hold
I prefer the original lp version, which sounded like Crazy Horse were on it, the one you get on the trans cd is a bit more motorik
Just what I was about to say
but was too afraid to do so.
That tour was the first time that I saw NY live and he was fantastic. An archive release would go some way to restoring this album's reputation, I think
I, too, quite like Trans
although Like An Inca was a deal-breaker, for me.
Berlin Live is a an excellent way to experience several of the songs from Trans - Neil Young and Nils Lofgren hamming it up to great effect. You get the added bonus of Bruce Palmer on bass. He must have overcome his shyness somewhat by 1982 - here he is playing with his back to the audience on a TV performance by Buffalo Springfield in 1966:
And, like I said previously, I think his Berlin performance of Like A Hurricane is the best release ever. It's well worth picking up a copy of the DVD.
Fork In The Road
The new one, which he was promoting at Glastonbury last year, has yet to affect me. It's just a bit beige. And then it ends. Maybe I'll understand one day...
but certainly not required listening.
EVERY ALBUM
Is worth listening to, but sometimes his shite filter was switched off, so they do vary in terms of depth of quality....I did like Trans tho', still do.
Rust Never Sleeps
was my intro to NY thanks to an ecstatic Nick Kent review in the NME. I already knew I was going to like him though as the NME Illustrated thingy of rock said he had a penchant for singing melodic rock n roll songs in a quavery high-pitched voice